Thursday, February 09, 2006

Healey's Donation to Deval

Ad hominem time here — until yesterday, we had no idea how god-awful Kerry Healey's accent and speech patterns are. We had only heard snippets.

In yesterday's announcement for the Massachusetts governor's race, she presented her full cacophony. Every time she opens her mouth in the campaign, she's going to be handing Deval Patrick votes.

Note: At least short term, Channel 5 has a clip on this story that includes harsh Healey.

She's worse than Connecticut's Sen. Joe Lieberman, the alleged Democrat, who is also terrible to hear. Of course, the sound should be far less significant than the substance. On the other hand, if you don't want to listen to her campaign speeches, if her words are so grating that you question her credibility, you sure won't want to hear her for years as governor.

Her family moved her around when she was a kid, but apparently she has been in Beverly long enough to pick up what is unquestionably the worst of all New England subregional accents. The North Shore accent and speech patterns are as nasal and grating as any anywhere. Imagine a jenny ass simultaneously braying and growling. Awful, simply awful.

It's good that there are so few of them and that they tend to keep to themselves.

In contrast, Patrick is mellifluous and very easy to listen to in long stretches as well as sound bites. He also has content and substance. Healey seems to be trying what worked for Romney — unfulfillable promises of lowering taxes permanently and tambourine-shaking fear of a solidly Democratic government.

Small sub-rant: Many of our so-called Democratic legislators and officials are DINOs and socially regressive. Others, such as the senate president, say much and act little. No one should be concerned about swapping the governor's party.

Healey's handlers would do well to keep her off the debate stage, to let others speak for her as often as possible, and to limit her orations to slogans. She's a rich lady from Beverly, not used to personal criticism. Somebody needs to tell her quickly.

1 comment:

It may be that the language barrier is what doomed my career as a flack for a North Shore musuem. The rich donors spoke...whatever that is that la Healey speaks. Some had more nasal inflection: that may vary according to prep school.

Dear old Da, though he didn't want his offspring speaking Welsh, did want them to speak English. I expect I'm somewhat corrupted after 35 years on the North Shore, but one tends to retain the inflections learnt before puberty. Deval looks more intriguing every day.